X-Mas Escapades
by leiascully
Summary: The Lone Gunmen play Santa for absent Mulder.


X-Mas Escapades by Mary Parker  
Email - paelitopen@yahoo.com  
Spoilers - Not really.  
Disclaimer - Not mine. Dammit.  
Notes - This is the first decent Frohike fic I've ever finished, so please, review it and tell me what you think.   
  
I knock on the door three times, not too loud. Her neighbors never liked us anyway, no point in  
aggravating them on Christmas Eve. Byers yawns and tries to look awake, joggling his bag of  
presents so they rustle in their pretty paper. I wrapped them myself, after we got them in the mail  
from him. Did a damn good job of it too, crisp edges and sharp corners like he'd never do. She'll  
know, but it doesn't matter. I knock again. Langly scratches himself and rubs his eyes behind his  
glasses.  
  
"Maybe she went to bed," he says, pissed that I dragged him out of bed, but just then we hear the  
bolt being undone and she opens the door. The first thing I notice is that she's wearing a  
bathrobe, and I can't see any pajama shirt under it. Holy Mother of God. I have to slap myself  
around mentally to regain motor functions. She must have been feeding the kid; she's still holding  
him. My godson. Who'd have thought? I wiggle my fingers at him and he blinks. He's got her  
big blue eyes, the ones that are currently giving me a Look despite the hour. Jesus, she's even got  
the eyebrow turned on me. I adjust my Santa hat and try to ignore the fact that she's giving me  
that what-is-it-now look.   
  
"Merry Christmas?" I didn't mean it to be a question, but her standing there is enough to make a  
grown man fall to his knees and weep. She's a hell of a lady, even half dressed in the middle of  
the night with her hair all mussy and her kid in her arms. If I didn't respect Mulder so much, I  
would have gone for her years ago. As it is, the only thing I do is send flowers on her birthday,  
anonymous of course. Mulder would kick my ass if I did anything more. Hell, she'd do it herself,  
new mother or no. Dana Scully is not someone to be trifled with, and frankly, I respect her too  
much to try. I didn't even try to talk to her when he disappeared last time. I remember she made  
me coffee when we thought he was dead, but I was stinking drunk, and that's not the way I want  
her to think of me. Standing in her doorway, I hiss at Byers, and he holds up his bag. She looks  
us over, sighs, and steps back to let us in, going to put William back in his crib.   
  
I look around the living room. She's got it all decorated for Christmas, tree and all. There's a  
string of colored lights around the window that blink on and off, and a framed picture of her and  
Mulder and the kid on the desk next to her computer. They must have taken it just before he left,  
because she's in her robe again. She comes back in the room, a grey shirt peeking out at the top  
of her robe, running her hand through her hair to settle it. Her eyes rest on us and a little smirk  
comes to her perfect lips. I know exactly what she's thinking. We're a bunch of greasy hackers  
dressed as elves. Don't quit your day job.  
  
"Er...Santa was busy, so he sent us. Hope you don't mind." Her mouth quirks, but she doesn't  
say anything. "Want these under the tree?"  
  
"Are they from you or him?" There's a tiny spark of hope in her eyes.   
  
"Mulder sent them to us to deliver." The lucky bastard. I never knew anyone could look that  
good in a bathrobe. A hell of a lady, like I said, and she can shoot better than I can and slice up  
dead people too.   
  
"Ah." It almost catches in her throat. She gets up and heads for the kitchen. "I'm going to make  
some tea. Anyone want anything? I have coffee, juice, eggnog...." She stands in front of the  
open fridge as if she's forgotten why she's there.   
  
"Eggnog sounds good, thanks." I elbow Byers and Langly.  
  
"Tea, please," says Byers obediently.  
  
"Eggnog," says Langly, all surly. No wonder. He's wearing a green hat with a bell on the end  
and a t-shirt that says "Present Patrol" and has a picture of a sleigh with reindeer on it. Scully  
shivers and takes the eggnog out of the fridge and turns on the teapot. Byers helps her find  
glasses and teacups and pours the nog as she gets out the tea. Langly and I stand around looking  
awkward. The bag of presents is in the middle of the table, and I can tell she's trying hard to  
ignore it. She doesn't want to seem to eager, but the truth is she hasn't heard from him in so long  
she can hardly stand it. That is, if he's any indication. He says it's too dangerous to talk to her  
directly, but he sends us messages to give to her. Sometimes we call her up and leave them on  
her answering machine with the voice synthesizer that got us in trouble a couple of years ago in  
Las Vegas.   
  
The teapot whistles and she pours water into the cups. I can see her hand shake, just a little bit.   
She makes sure everyone has something before she lets us go back to the living room. She sits  
down on the couch and puts her tea down.  
  
"Well?" she says, no quiver in her voice at all, but her fingers are at the base of her throat,  
fidgeting with the collar of the t-shirt. Suddenly I recognize it as Mulder's, another indication of  
just how much she's missing him. If I could be him for you....but I never will be, so I settle for  
being his messenger. But God damn, she's beautiful with the lamplight turning her hair into a  
halo. An FBI angel. Langly drops the bag in my lap, distracting me, and goes to mess with her  
computer. Byers admires the decorations politely. It's left to me to deal with this. I clear my  
throat, a froggy dwarf with a Santa hat.   
  
"You want Will's presents under the tree?"  
  
She reaches for the little package. "It doesn't matter. He couldn't open it." Her hands are  
trembling again, but she unwraps it carefully, sliding her fingernails under the tape. She takes off  
the paper and folds it up again before she looks at the book. "Runaway Bunny," she says.   
"How...appropriate." Her fingers stroke the book just a little bit before she puts it away on the  
table with her tea. I pull her present out of the bag and hand it to her. Her hands run all over it  
before she loosens the tape, this time. She barely bothers with the paper, just drops it in front of  
her, and turns the book over. "Moby Dick," she breathes, so soft and sweet I can barely stand it.   
I never knew great literature had that effect on women. Maybe I ought to read more. She closes  
her eyes like she's in pain and murmurs something about hell and apple dumplings under her  
breath. I know better than to ask what. She can't seem to stop touching the book, rubbing her  
fingers over the covers. It's a pretty book, all bound in leather with gold lettering, and old. Old  
with a capital O kind of antique, but I don't see what's so special about it. Call me Ishmael,  
right? It must mean something to the two of them though, because I've never seen her act this  
way over anything, even him.   
  
She sets it in her lap finally, tears in her blue eyes that I know I'll never see fall. She smiles at me  
and that's all I want for Christmas right there. "Anything else?" she says, as if she didn't just go  
doe-eyed over a used book.   
  
"Right here." I hand her the cd. Her forehead wrinkles up.  
  
"What's this?"  
  
I shrug, as if me and the boys haven't gone over it six different ways from Sunday. Even Jimmy  
tried to help, the big lunk. You can't play cds backwards, but he doesn't seem to get it. Good  
thing we left him home. He'd probably fall all over Scully and the kid too, volunteer to babysit or  
some nonsense. Then again, that might be a good idea. Now she's looking at it, all confused.   
It's a burned cd, not labeled. She looks at it for a good long minute, then walks over to her cd  
player and puts it in. Byers and Langly are watching her out of the corner of their eyes, trying to  
be subtle. I watch her outright. The first couple of notes don't mean anything to her. All old  
Christmas music sounds the same. She doesn't understand until Bing Crosby starts singing.  
  
"I'll be home for Christmas..." By the time old Bing gets to the second line, she's pale as the  
snow outside, her eyes closed. I round up the boys, wanting to get out of here before it gets to  
his message, him pouring his guts out so they don't have to fill up his whole visit with talking.   
We listened to it once, to make sure there wasn't anything for us. It makes me uneasy thinking of  
it, like I got caught spying. I leave the bag under the tree; it's still got stuff for them in it from the  
three of us. As we walk out, I look back at her, silhouetted against the window. I could swear I  
see a tear fall, like a crystal raindrop, but I turn away and make sure to lock the door on my way  
out.  
  
Merry Christmas, Scully. You two deserve it. 


End file.
